The Long Drop
by Menamebephil
Summary: After the war, Sokka finds his talents requisitioned by the King of Omashu, who charges him with stopping a murderer. Updates Mondays.
1. These Mean Streets

Mai slipped and stumbled through the night air, wheezing and bent almost double, one hand clamped hard on her left side. Slowly, she collapsed, first sinking to one knee before she flopped back and her head hit stone wall, sliding down until she sat, slumped, in the alley. This, she groggily decided, had to be one of the worse days in her recent memory. For one thing, she was pretty sure she'd just been murdered.

* * *

"Do we have to do this every time?" Sokka groaned, sitting reluctantly across from the King. Bumi, in response, gave a one-toothed smile.

"If you don't like pai sho, some people might wonder why you decided to join a pai sho club."

"I'm not totally convinced _I_ did any of the deciding. It seems to be one of those things that just happened to me," Sokka replied, wearily. "It was this or argue with Zuko's Uncle until I lost."

"Ha! The Dragon of the West is tenacious, that's for sure. Anyway, it's your move."

Sokka blinked, and stared down at the board. This was just so _stupid._ Picking a tile, he played a move, and sat back.

"So," he said, as the King of Omashu studied the board. "Hear you've got a murder problem."

* * *

Was it, she wondered, as the stars smeared together, technically murder yet? She was.. she was pretty sure she wasn't dead yet. Unless the afterlife had been _really_ talked up.

* * *

Sokka narrowed his eyes as he made another move, more or less at random.

"What I don't get is why you need _me_. You're still King, right? With all the guards and watchmen and watchwomen you could ever tell to go catch a murderer…" Sokka left it hanging, hopefully, but Bumi stayed silent, smiling inscrutably.

Great. So he was going to have to figure it out. What a waste of time.

* * *

It probably wasn't! Mai decided, fuzzily, as her vision traced the cracks on the wall opposite. It probably wasn't murder yet, even though she _had_ killed her, because she hadn't been killed yet. If she got arrested _now_ , they'd have to wait a while before they could charge her with anything.

That made sense, sure.

* * *

" _So,"_ Sokka huffed, pushing a tile across the board just because he could, "what I got told is that there's been a bunch of mysterious disappearances slash almost certainly serial murders in Omashu, and since I was in the area, why don't I drop by? But that makes _no sense_ , does it? That wasn't a rhetorical question, please answer that."

Bumi nodded encouragingly, but stayed silent. Of course.

"I thought 'why would a guy with his own standing army want some Water Tribes guy poking around instead' and the only thing I could come up with was ...you don't think your own guys are up to it. So either you hire total morons, or.. you don't think they'll _want_ this guy caught."

It was, Sokka thought, a pretty good line. It deserved a flash of lightning outside the window, or at _least_ someone gasping in shock.

Bumi just grinned, and waved for him to keep going. Jerk.

* * *

It occurred to Mai, in a groggy kind of way, that it was a little gender-essentialist of her to assume that her soon-to-be murderer was a she.

It wasn't like Mai had got a good look at them. They'd been running by the time she'd pulled herself to her feet, and by that time she'd had a choice between going after them or holding her guts in.

She was starting to wonder if she'd made the wrong call on that one.

* * *

Sokka glared, and pushed a tile without bothering to check which one it was. He couldn't believe he _still_ had to keep going with this. It wasn't like there was a murderer on the loose or anything.

"Okay, so, why wouldn't your guards want a serial killer off the streets? That's the kind of thing guards are supposed to do. But your guards are all old soldiers, aren't they? Which means," he said, slouching back and steepling his fingers, "the victims are all Fire Nation, right?"

Bumi just beamed indulgently, like Sokka had just passed a test. Which, he guessed, he kind of had.

Sokka rubbed his temples. "I promised myself I'd avoid the political stuff from now on. Fine, okay, I'll do it. Aang's busy at the moment anyway."

"Excellent!" Bumi crowed, and pushed back his chair. "I'll provide you with a letter saying you can do what you want. You've got a place to stay?"

Sokka seesawed his hand. "...Hypothetically?"

"Good enough!" the King replied, sweeping his hand expansively across the table. "And I have to congratulate you on your win! Very unpredictable!"

Sokka blinked, staring, at what remained of the board after his completely random moves. Silently, his lips moved as he tried to work out how hard Bumi had to have worked in order to make sure Sokka won.

"...You are completely terrifying, you know that?"

"I'm sure I have no idea what you're talking about. Now, off you go, murderers aren't about to catch themselves." He waved a hand in an airy fashion, and an armoured man with a bushy beard materialised at his elbow. "You remember Captain Yung?"

Sokka's brow furrowed with the effort. "...Oh yeah! Pentapox Guy!"

Yung shuddered. "Please don't call me that."

"Yung can show you around if there's anywhere you need to go."

"Great," Sokka said, standing abruptly. "Can you start by showing me where-" he fished in his pocket for a slip of paper, which he squinted at intently "The Four Nations Hostel, No Fleas In Our Beds We Promise is?"

* * *

She'd slipped over somehow, the weight of sitting upright too much, and the lance of fire in her side wasn't enough to get her upright again so all she could do was shift a little so the pain was only blinding and keep her hand over the wound.

This, she decided, was probably about right. Gurgling to death in a freezing Omashu alleyway was _exactly_ the point the last couple of years had been building up to.

* * *

Sokka trotted at a brisk pace through the streets, following after Yung and not thinking much further than the promise of flea-free sheets, and vaguely noticed that, as they got further and further down the city, closer to the gorge, there seemed to be less and less to recommend the place. Houses got shorter, and shabbier. People shut their windows as the two passed them. The streets got narrower. Sokka was just starting to wonder what this meant for that promise of a complete absence of fleas when the earthbender suddenly froze. Sokka nearly collided with him, but pulled himself short just in time to see what the man had noticed.

After a moment, Sokka found his voice.

"That's probably a bad sign, right? Blood in the streets? And not, you know, in a metaphor for civil unrest way, an actual puddle?"

Yung nodded, and was already scanning the streets by the time Sokka squatted down at the dark stain on the flagstones.

"This would be so much easier if we weren't on stone," Sokka complained indistinctly, as he stared down into the gloom. "Still… I guess Bleed Guy went that way?" He gestured down one of the roads. "Come on, can't leave guys to bleed all over the street, it's not tidy."

"I suppose not," sighed Yung, and the two trotted into the gloom.

* * *

It wasn't so cold any more, she thought, through the haze. That was good. As long as she stayed still it'd all be okay.

The wall across had about a two-foot sliver of moonlight across it, in the sliver she could see a long lightning-bolt of cracks, thin and jagged, where it looked like something'd hit the wall high up a long time ago and nobody had fixed it.

* * *

"Well," Sokka sighed, pushing himself up, "I guess we can stop hurrying. Whoever we're chasing's left pretty much all their blood across the road. If they're not dead yet I'd kinda like to know the reason why."

"Cheerful thought," Yung observed, while privately noting that Sokka had not in fact slowed down.

"I'm not a healer, but I know that if more of your blood is outside of you than in it's usually a bad sign," Sokka replied, with a shuttered sigh. "Still, they've covered a fair amount of ground, so they must have been pretty tough."

The pair turned a corner into an alley, and Sokka froze.

"Tadah," he said, wearily, gesturing to an indistinct black shape, slumped in the dirt. Yung's eyes widened in the gloom as the figure swam into focus.

There was a sharp intake of breath as Sokka stepped uncertainly forward.

"What the crap?" he murmured. " _Mai_?"

* * *

The sixth crack went diagonally to the left and then the light was gone she couldn't see what had happened where _was_ she?

She was here it was cold and she had to stay _still_ … where _was_ she?

* * *

Sokka leaned closer to the figure, and squinted.

"She's alive!" he squeaked, looking her up and down, as Yung let out a breath he didn't realise he'd been holding. "Clammy skin, pale- paler than usual, she's conscious but I think she's in shock, let's have a look-" he reached down to where Yung could see Mai's hand, stained black with blood, covering the wound in her side.

* * *

No! Stay _still_!

* * *

Sokka sat back on his haunches after the unsuccessful attempt to move the girl's arm, and pulled a blue shirt from his small knapsack. He quickly tore a long strip from it, and, with some delicate wrestling, managed to slip it between Mai's hand and her injury. That accomplished, he put a hand to her forehead, and frowned.

"Yung," he said, smooth and businesslike, "you know any healers in this part of town? Waterbender ones, if possible."

Yung's brow furrowed. "...Yes. A woman by the name of Ikka. Arrived about a year ago. Specialises in diseases of the wealthy." He didn't bother to flatten the disdain in his voice.

"Perfect. Go get her. Mai's rich. Or was? Never mind. Go now, I'll stay here."

Shaking his head, Yung took off at a run.

* * *

The strain of fighting was too much. Too tiring, her arms were so heavy, she couldn't-

With only the barest twinge of frustration, Mai slipped into darkness.

* * *

Scowling, Sokka checked her temperature, and didn't much care for what he found. He rummaged through his pack until he found a dark poncho, and draped it over her. If she appreciated it, she didn't say so.

"You realise this makes us even, right?" he said, gently easing Mai onto her back, sitting cross-legged on the ground at her feet, and propping her heels up onto his folded knees. "You save me at Boiling Rock, I save you at Omashu. Actually I don't think you even _meant_ to save me, so does this mean I'm ahead?"

She looked… well it probably wasn't going to be a fair assessment right now, Sokka conceded. In his experience, people rarely looked their best when they'd just been stabbed. Still, she looked pretty rough. Probably fairer to save a more detailed analysis for when she wasn't lying in an alley in the middle of the night.

"What _happened_ to you?" Sokka wondered aloud. "Last I saw you, you were… still with Zuko, right? Must've been a couple of years ago now, right after that whole Zuko's Mom thing. That was such a weird time. I'd heard you guys'd broke up, and that you'd kind of vanished, but that was kind of it? In my defence I've been busy. If anyone knew where you'd gone, I missed it." His brow screwed up with the effort of dredging up years-old memories. "There was… something about a letter? Or was that back during the war? I'm definitely sure I remember Zuko talking about a letter more than once."

Mai lay still and silent. Sokka frowned, and tried to listen out for any sign that Yung had found the healer.

"I hope you don't die," Sokka said, to the mist. "I'm pretty sure you can help me with my inquiries, for one thing."


	2. A Game for Knights

"Okay this boring," Sokka huffed, slumping in his chair. Across from him, Yung folded his arms, leaning on the wall.

The two of them were cramped in the small hallway that served as Healer Ikka's waiting room. The healer, a short woman a few years older than Sokka, had taken one look at Mai, blandly informed them that it would cost extra on account of the fact that she'd be losing a lot of sleep, and had Yung carefully earthbend Mai back to the pokey little apartment that she apparently used as a clinic. Then she'd shut herself in a room with Mai and sternly told the two of them to get out of the way.

That had been hours ago. Now the sun was creeping through the narrow window, birds were chirping, the sounds of the city were filling the background, and Sokka's foot had entirely gone to sleep, while the rest of him had remained distressingly awake.

"I need to walk," Sokka declared, pushing himself up before stumbling on his numb foot and almost falling back again. "I'm going to go find breakfast, want anything?"

Yung shook his head.

"Okay, just keep an eye on things here? I'll be back soon."

* * *

Stepping out into the frigid morning, Sokka couldn't repress a shudder as the stiff wind hit him.

That was just _embarrassing_. He'd definitely been away from the South Pole too long if Omashu Winters were enough to get him shivering. Katara would definitely be laughing at him if she ever found out about this one.

Okay, so, hideous stain on his national pride aside, he could really do with a coat.

* * *

Healer Ikka scowled, as she applied her hand to the wound again.

People, in her experience, took water healing for granted. They thought all she had to do was hold her hand in a bowl, stick it on the injury, watch the glow for a while, and then collect the money. They didn't think about the effort involved in knitting muscle together, or holding veins in place. When she tried to explain marrow customers just made a face. And then they acted like she was overcharging them, because as far as _they_ knew, all she'd done was stick her hand on the affected area for a while.

Speaking of which, she wondered who was going to be paying her for this one. The Earth Kingdom soldier was probably out, so that just left The Famous Sokka (travelling companion of Avatar Aang, warrior of the Southern Tribes, sometime lover to Princess Yue) or the Fire Nation girl.

Which presented Ikka with something of a conundrum. She had a (hitherto entirely theoretical) policy of providing discounts to anyone that had been involved in saving the world from the Fire Nation, but she _also_ had a strict, and much more rigorously followed, policy of applying a Fire Nation tax. It wasn't extortion, she was pretty sure. It was just ...reparations. She told herself she'd stop once she'd accrued enough to afford a house that was as nice as the one that had been flattened in the siege of the North.

* * *

"Have you got one in blue? I feel it would look better in blue."

The tailor waved expansively around his shop, at the various coats, hats, and shirts, all decidedly in Earth Kingdom colours.

Sokka sighed. "Fine. It'll do," he said, with bad grace.

It wasn't, he conceded, as he pulled the sleeve over his arm, a _bad_ coat- it was long, and well-made, and had deep pockets. It was just that tan wasn't really his colour.

* * *

Ikka nodded, as the girl's eyes creaked open.

It was a little impressive how she went through confusion to panic to violence within less than a second. It was a good thing Ikka had taken precautions.

"Your knives are in the other room. You can have them back if you're a good patient, and don't try to attack me."

The girl glowered, ungratefully, but settled back down, trying to conceal a wince.

Oh yes.

"Thank you. Now, this might be an easy question, but tell me: where does it hurt?"

* * *

Sokka stepped out into the weak winter sunshine, and set off in search of breakfast. He set his shoulders, cramming his fists into the pockets of his new coat, and strode out, trying to get a feel for the city.

This part of Omashu was three bad words away from a war zone. Piles of debris, irregular cracks in the street itself, the occasional smashed building sticking out like a missing tooth, the scars of the city's recent past were raw and obvious. Old men set up market stalls, flashing old wounds while young people tried to hide new ones.

Overhead, cargo shuttles rattled on long stone rails, carrying goods from higher up the hill down to the warehouses on the outer edge of the city, perched above the canyon. Wealth surrounded this part of the city, above, below, and overhead, not once settling on the streets themselves. This was the place where the refugees, the immigrants, the unwanted were sent, and you could feel the tension in the air, everyone aware of their place on the ladder, and working hard to make sure nobody else climbed up ahead of them.

And beyond it all, there was a killer. Sokka had a list, from Yung- thirteen names. Ten missing, three found, though not talking even if they wanted to. Thirteen murders, and nobody wanted to know.

This wasn't a city. This was a tundra, full of a thousand invisible dangers. But he was the only hunter with a long enough spear to… to…

Sokka tried to rub the sleep out of his eyes, and shook his head, picking up the pace, coat flapping about his calves. He _really_ needed to get something to eat.

* * *

Ikka blinked heavily, and stifled a yawn as she reached for the vials. Fumbling for what she was looking for, she poured a generous dose into a small cup, and turned back to the bed, where her patient was fixing her with a glare that could melt a glacier.

"Here," Ikka said, maintaining a front of professionalism in the face of this base lack of gratitude. "Drink this."

The girl took the cup, but made no move to drink it. Ikka rolled her eyes.

"I've spent the last six hours making sure you _didn't_ die. I'm not going to poison you now. It's a pain relief medicine."

The girl scowled at the cup, but drank in one swallow.

Ikka reflected that sometimes this job was not worth it at all.

* * *

The tea shop was small and pokey, but it had seats and served hot things Sokka could put in his face, so it ticked all the relevant boxes.

As he sipped his tea and waited for food to arrive, he fished the list Yung had given him out of his pocket, and studied it again.

It made for pretty grim reading. Thirteen names, a few dates, in the few cases when it was actually _known_ when the person had vanished, and a little five-word summary of each victim's existence. Like, say, Wen, the first victim to be _found_ \- he'd been a fish merchant who'd moved to Omashu following the disastrous initial attempts to clear the colonies. Lived in the poor quarter, sold fish. Someone found him in an alley with his throat cut last Spring. Some of the victims got less than that. The Sun family, all three of them, just vanished one day, leaving all their stuff behind, and that was everything Sokka knew about that. It was a real testament to how seriously the previous investigators had been taking the case, Sokka thought, sourly.

At the bottom of the list (Jing, waitress, vanished walking home from work two weeks ago) Sokka idly scribbled a fresh entry.

 _Mai (that one)- found stabbed in alley near warehouse district. Not dead. Occupation: idle rich, former Fire Nation military. In Omashu for reasons unknown._

He sighed, and massaged his temples. This was a real mess he'd gotten handed. 'Hey Sokka want to solve a bunch of murders? The city guard don't care but you're not busy, right?' Still, he guessed he shouldn't complain. At least this way he was out of the way, and being at least a little useful.

* * *

When Sokka made it back to the clinic, he was confronted with the sight of Captain Yung trying, and very nearly failing, not to laugh.

"She's awake," he explained, to Sokka's unasked question.

Alright. Some good news. But that didn't explain why Yung had suddenly realised what a sense of humour was for. Shaking his head, Sokka headed for the door to the main room.

The healer stepped out of it before he could reach it, and stopped him with an outstretched hand.

"If you're going in, a word of warning," she said, and Sokka paused. "The blood loss combined with the pain medicine's left her… a little loopy."

Well that could be… interesting. Without anything particularly clever to say, Sokka stayed quiet, and stepped past her, into the room.

* * *

The ceiling was really ugly, Mai had decided after staring at it for about ten minutes. Ugly and lumpy and cracked and _beige_ , that was the worst thing. Earth Kingdom colours were so _dismal_ , so bland.

How she'd ended up in this city, she had _no_ idea. It had to be the most uninteresting place in the entire world. It was so unbearably bleak she swore she could feel _herself_ becoming less interesting on some days. If she stayed here too long her own parents wouldn't recognise her.

No, wait, that had been the point, hadn't it? Probably. That or to get away from Zuko.

As she pondered this, pleasantly drifting along on a cloud of opiates, a door opened, and a tan smear floated into the room.

* * *

Sokka cleared his throat, as Mai blinked, owlishly, her head slowly turning to face him.

She looked… now it was morning he felt he could say it with some authority: she looked pretty bad. Her hair was long and straight but looked like it hadn't seen a brush in about a month, which clashed with his vague memory of complicated buns and a fringe you could kill a man with, and he suspected she probably had. Everything about her looked tired, like she'd spent a year on the run, or, possibly, she'd been stabbed in an alleyway last night. Either or.

Eventually, she said something.

"Heeey," she slurred, "it's you. That one… that one Ty never shut up about."

"Oh?" he squeaked.

"Yeah… yeah? Unless you're that other guy."

Sokka felt he was losing his grip on the situation. "...Which other guy?"

Mai waved a hand dismissively. "You know the one. Tall. Had hair."

Sokka frowned. "...Zuko?" he suggested, before remembering why he shouldn't.

Mai made a face. "Ugh."

This was getting off track. "Mai, I need to ask if you saw-" hang on, better check something first. "Mai, are you aware you got stabbed last night?"

Mai looked down at her bandaged torso. "Yup."

Great, now they were getting somewhere. "Did you see who did it?"

Mai's brow creased. "...Nope."

Damnit. He sighed. "Okay, so, I guess we'd better get you home? Which is..?" he prompted, and Mai gestured somewhere over her shoulder. "Fantastic. Hey, Yung!" he hollered at the corridor, and when the Captain's head appeared in the room, he continued: "you wouldn't happen to know where Mai's living in the city?"

Yung snorted. "Our wannabe-conqueror here? Of course I know where she lives. You think I would let her step into this city without knowing that?"

Sokka waved him down. "Lectures later, she's not listening. An address. She needs to sleep this off."

Ikka helped Mai to her feet, and scowled. Gesturing over to the dresser, she nodded at Sokka.

"You'd better take those for her. I don't think she should be near knives until the medicine wears off. Also I hate to sound like I'm repeating myself but am I getting paid for this?"

"Oh, good point," Sokka said, nodding. "Pay the lady, Yung."

Ikka beamed, as the big Captain scowled and reached for his purse. Well, that sorted _that_ little dilemma.

* * *

Walking was tricky since it felt like she had more legs than usual, but eventually she found herself bundled politely into a sedan, and presently her house appeared, which was convenient.

The voice of whatsisname by her side followed her up to her door.

"This the place?" he said.

Mai nodded.

"Cool. Well, guess I'll be going? I mean… _you_ wouldn't know where The Four Nations Hostel is?"

Mai scowled. _No_.

"You can stay here," she said, swaying only a little as she unlocked the door. "I have a guest room."

She didn't bother to listen for a reply before staggering off in search of a bed. Hers, preferably, but she wasn't about to be picky.


	3. Neither Tarnished Nor Afraid

There was, Sokka was beginning to realise, a kind of awkwardness infinitely worse than even the usual weirdness that came with being the first person to be up in a house that wasn't his, and that was the awkwardness of being the only person awake in a house that wasn't his while not being _totally_ sure that the actual owner of the house, once she woke up from her drug-induced haze, would actually remember inviting him to stay in the first place.

This thought occupied him for a while, before he decided that while he was here, he might as well get some breakfast.

After he'd gone through his usual bedtime routine (check for traps/assassins, identify at least two avenues of escape, stick knife under pillow, chew a bit of bark to clean teeth, prop something up against the door so if someone breaks in in the night it'd fall and wake him up) he hadn't checked the house much, and so he decided he might as well take a look at the place.

The first thing that struck him was how… _small_ it was. The spare room was actually a little _smaller_ than his igloo back home (which was his standard unit of measurement when it came to houses), and the other rooms on the top floor- the one Mai had vanished into, and another which turned out to be storage- couldn't be much larger than that.

Sokka had, to his own continued confusion, managed to get inside a _lot_ of fancy houses in the last couple of years, most of the time with the owners knowing he was there and _letting_ him. He had a vague idea about how the stupidly rich were supposed to live. It involved fancy wall hangings and ornaments and servants sitting in the corner playing a sungi horn.

Maybe it was the tsungi hornist's day off.

The ground floor had a bathroom, and a living room, which looked like it had been decorated with the same level of enthusiasm Mai gave to everything, which meant that one of the crossbeams had a neat row of knives lodged into it, and that combined with a slight depression in one of the chairs was almost the only sign that a human had ever lived there.

And there was a kitchen.

Presently, he discovered two things: firstly, that given the position of the sun it had to be well past noon, and secondly, it didn't look like Mai actually kept any food in the house.

This, in Sokka's considered opinion, was confusing.

Figuring this might be a good time to stretch his investigative muscles, he perched on a stool in Mai's barren, but otherwise quite tidy, pantry, and considered the implications.

Unfortunately, given his state of mind, the first implication that he came up with was: it was going to be a lot more difficult to get breakfast, and his thought process more or less stopped there.

* * *

Mai woke sluggishly, tangled in bleary confusion and three separate blankets. Shaking sleep from her head, she pushed herself up onto her elbows, and squinted around what eventually resolved itself into her bedroom. Or, rather, the bedroom in Omashu that was, for the moment, hers.

It was important to keep thinking like that. Otherwise she might think she was going to _stay_ here.

But she had woken up in a room she owned, which was pretty good, considering-

Considering, now she remembered it, that someone had tried pretty hard to kill her.

Right. That had happened.

Wincing only a little as she pulled herself upright and swung her bare feet out over the bed, she shivered in the cool morning air. Water healing, she grudgingly conceded, had its uses.

 _However_ , she thought, as her eyes fixed on a small bottle placed on a bedside table, there were _definitely_ some things about modern medicine that she wasn't in favour of.

She threw the bottle of pain medicine out of the window, which made her feel like her day was moving in a positive direction.

* * *

Sokka had a plan.

Not for tracking down the murderer, it was way too early to come up with _that_ one, and not for helping with Zuko's Situation- he'd agreed to come to Omashu more or less to get _out_ of that- but he did have a plan for dealing with the Mai Issue.

The issue being, of course, that she'd technically invited him to stay in her spare room, which was awesome and really convenient for him, _but_ she'd kind of been under the influence of some pretty strong stuff, and so she might actually have totally forgotten that she did that.

He had that totally under control, though. Because: breakfast. Nobody could resist breakfast.

Or, technically, a late lunch? Early dinner?

Whatever it was called, he'd stepped out of the house, tracked down the first street food vendor he could find, bought some of everything, given that he actually had no clue what Mai might like, and now here he was. Standing at her door, working up the nerve to knock.

He realised too late that he had no idea if she was actually awake yet.

* * *

Mai lumbered heavily down the stairs, in the vague direction of what she hoped was going to be a convenient source of food. There was, she was almost certain, some cold pig-chicken left. Or there had been. At some point.

Okay, she conceded in the privacy of her thoughts, she'd let a couple of things slip. Keeping a well-stocked pantry hadn't been high on her list of priorities. Maybe she should have hired some help after all.

She shivered as her bare feet hit the stone floor, and she tugged her blanket closer around her. It occurred to her, not for the first time in recent months, that she couldn't keep this up for much longer. Sooner rather than later, _something_ was going to give.

Fortunately, at this moment something arrived to distract her from this gloomy road, with a sharp knock at the door.

* * *

Sokka blinked stupidly as the door creaked open, after only his seventeenth time knocking.

Mai stared placidly at him from the doorway, looking appreciably less dead than last night (this morning). She'd even dressed- varying layers and types of black, because apparently Mai had figured out her look early in life and never seen the need to mix it up- and Sokka felt the strange urge to crane his neck to try and check if her knives and dart launchers were still on the hall table where he'd left them.

He had a thing about knowing if people who'd spent some time trying to kill him were currently heavily armed. Unkind people called him 'paranoid' or 'in need of some kind of serious help', but in his view he wasn't at all dead yet, so it had to be working.

Seeing that she was still as animated and talkative as your average ice floe, he proffered the bag, hoping that the wafting scents of grease and salt would wake her up.

She raised an eyebrow, slowly, and stepped aside.

"Sure, whatever."

As he followed her into the house, he was momentarily confused by the sight of a blanket lodged in the corner of the hall that he _definitely_ didn't remember being there.

* * *

She'd invited him to stay. Why had she done that? What kind of leap of logic had made her think that _Sokka_ , official crony of the Avatar and weird best friend of Zuko's, would be a good choice of houseguest?

For all that he and Zuko had been more or less joined at the hip whenever he'd showed up at the palace, Mai had never really gotten to know Sokka. She'd recognised him as that guy with the infuriating ability to not die when she tried to kill him, and she was pretty sure Azula had kept a file or something on him, but other than that he was the guy with the boomerang (she absolutely didn't care about boomerangs, no matter what anyone said about any boomerangs that might have gone missing in the vicinity of the palace. It hadn't been _all_ bad.)

Mai sighed to herself. If it turned out that she was just lonely, she was finding the deepest well she could, and jumping in it. If she ever had a second guest, she thought, somewhat sardonically, things were going to get kind of awkward.

* * *

"So," Sokka offered, leaning back into his seat, trying to discreetly push some of the dust off it while Mai was entirely engrossed in a bowl of sticky rice. "Someone tried to kill you, huh?"

Mai swallowed, serenely, set her chopsticks aside, and actually turned to face him.

"Looks like it."

Sokka nodded. "I know you said you didn't see who it was, but, you wouldn't happen to remember anything important?" he asked, hopefully. "Any convenient notes they left at the scene of the crime, any cries of 'haha! Now, I, [X], have my revenge'?"

Mai's brows furrowed in thought, and then somewhat more sharply in suspicion.

"Why do you care?"

Sokka found he was, to his mild shock, a little offended.

"Well, if you need a reason, I have been hired by King Bumi to find a serial killer that's been attacking Fire Nation citizens in this city. So, you know, kind of my job to care right now. Also, this might be a surprise to you but I tend to worry when people I know are getting attacked in the street. It comes up, believe me."

* * *

Mai nodded, slowly. That sounded like it made sense. Kind of.

"Okay." She leaned back, and tried to remember.

"It was late, and I was walking back home," she said, slowly, hoping he wouldn't ask the obvious question. "Foggy night, kind of damp. I slipped, stumbled a little, before I'd stood up properly someone bumped into me and left a massive hole in my side."

Sokka looked up from where he'd been scribbling notes.

"...That's all? You slipped up on a wet street, and the first person to bump into you decided to stick you with a knife?"

Mai bristled. "If you don't like it, you can take it up with them. That's how it happened. They were gone before I turned around, and I thought it might be a good idea to get off the street."

This seemed to placate him, and he nodded.

"Okay, covered that, so, any enemies?"

Mai gave him a blank look, and waited for a moment. Sokka rolled his eyes.

"We don't count any more. War's over, everyone's super-pals, don't you remember Zuko's speech? Okay, any _new_ enemies? Ones you made yourself, since you moved to this city?"

Mai thought about it.

"Not that I know of." It was, technically, true. She had tried to avoid having a social life.

Sokka, mercifully, didn't pick up on it, and finished his notes, setting the pad aside.

"Thanks. While we're on the topic, you moved to Omashu, huh."

Mai snorted. A real detective. "Yep."

"Was it to get away from Zuko?"

She actually blinked. "Wow. You really don't do tact, huh."

He shrugged. "I mean, I joined the White Lotus to get away from Suki. I mean, I definitely didn't join any super-secret Order that goes around clandestinely poking our I mean their noses into situations that don't have anything to do with them I mean us because we think we know what's best for everyone even if they don't agree. I absolutely didn't join any kind of secret society and if I did I really wouldn't be having second thoughts about it in any way at all."

Mai considered rolling her eyes. "You're a natural."

"Thank you. I have been practicing."

* * *

"So," Mai asked, sounding about as interested as if she was talking about the weather, "you got any plan for how you're going to catch them?"

He shrugged. "Not really," he admitted. "I literally only just got here."

Mai paused. "...Huh. Lucky break for me, then."

He figured that was as close as he was ever going to get to gratitude, and decided to take it.

"Alright," Mai said, suddenly unfolding her legs and sitting forward. "I'm in."

Well. Alright then. It beat having to wonder what she was doing and if the mysterious Night Stabber (he frowned to himself. Possibly think of a catchier name) was going to take another swipe at her. Plus, he had a definite memory of five hundred flying knives aiming directly at his face, and that was a really good thing to have between him and some invisible murder guy. (...No, that wasn't any better either.)

"Thanks," he said, digging into the pocket of his coat and pulling out the list of names. "...You wouldn't happen to have a map lying around, would you?"


	4. Heavier Than Broken Hearts

"Damnit," Sokka sighed, leaning back from the map. "I was kinda hoping for something there."

"What?" Mai asked. "That the murders would spell out a name or something?"

"It happens more often than you'd think," Sokka claimed, huffily. "Little known fact, but serial murderishness and a keen interest in cartography are surprisingly commonly linked."

"Is that a fact," Mai drawled, leaning over the table to examine the marks Sokka had made on the map of Omashu.

"Hey, which one of us was hired as the serial killer expert? _Exactly_."

It was remarkably easy, Mai was finding, to talk to Sokka. He reacted to protracted silences a lot like Ty Lee did- he barrelled over them without seeming to notice them at all, which suited Mai pretty well. She could tune him out as much as she liked, and when she was done with whatever thought she was occupied with, she could start paying a little attention again and she would have missed absolutely nothing of any value.

Speaking of Ty Lee, she was pretty sure Sokka was the one Ty had spent a good six weeks plotting to make hers, which was a pretty impressive feat of attention as far as Ty Lee was concerned. It hadn't been really noteworthy otherwise, though, at least at the time. Ty Lee being inappropriately infatuated with someone she really shouldn't be? Must be the weekend again.

It was probably best for everyone that she'd lost interest. Those two getting together would just lead to too much talking in one relationship. They'd be one of those couples people crossed the street to avoid.

Anyway, he'd stopped talking, which meant it was probably her cue to say something.

She looked at the map. Unfortunately, it looked like he'd been right- there wasn't an easy geographical link. The red crosses were scattered all over the city, from the slums to the mansion district. Mai had kind of been hoping that this was just a case that the city guard hadn't taken an interest in because they couldn't be bothered, not because it was going to be _difficult_.

"Alright, which one's closest?" she asked, on the basis that he'd probably been talking about going and having a look at one of the murder scenes.

"That'd be the Sun's house," he replied, and Mai held in a smirk. She'd gotten away with it again.

"Alright, so what's the deal there?"

Sokka shrugged. "The Suns, family of three, vanished one day, left all their stuff behind."

"Sounds fun." A memory prodded at her. "We picking up your bodyguard?" At his blank look, she elaborated. "Big Earth Kingdom guard, beard you could smuggle plums in? Pretty sure I remember seeing him around the place."

"Oh, Pentapox Guy! I kinda think he ditched us. Said something about getting on with his real job."

Mai looked unimpressed. "His real job of not catching murderers." Belatedly, her brain started turning. "Wait… pentapox? Why is that… oh." She narrowed her eyes at Sokka, who at least had the decency to preen. "That was _you_?"

"Guilty as charged," he said, not sounding at all contrite.

"That stunt completely sunk Dad's career in administration, I hope you realise," she scowled. Well, that and the whole Bumi thing, but no need to get into that.

Sokka shrugged. "I mean, we rescued a whole city from the tyrannical heel of the invaders, and we did it without anyone dying, so I don't know why you expect me to feel bad here."

He had a point, but she wasn't about to let him know that. "You also kidnapped my brother."

"Accidentally! And we gave him back even _after_ you guys totally went back on our deal. We didn't have to do that, you know. How is the little guy these days, anyway? He bit me on the hand once."

Mai shrugged. "Don't know. Haven't seen him in two years."

Sokka looked uncomfortably like he was about to say something sincere, but then thought better of it, pushing himself to his feet and rolling up the map.

"Come on, we're wasting daylight."

* * *

The sun had in fact almost set by the time they made it to the former Sun residence, a small terraced house on the fringes of Mai's neighbourhood- the kind of place a young family of independently wealthy Fire Nation types might buy, in order to not draw too much attention to themselves while still being in walking distance of the nice shops.

Sokka briefly wondered how Mai had managed to get property right in the middle of town surrounded by fancy Earth Kingdom upper crust. Apart from the huge bags of money, he had to think at least a couple of people had complained. Maybe she'd glared at them until they lost their nerve. He could respect that.

"It looks pretty quiet," she said. "How long have they been missing?"

Sokka, to his quiet annoyance, had to shrug. It wasn't like he'd been told this kind of thing. "Best guess anyone can make is maybe about a month ago? There seems to have been a real lack of interest."

"Hmm. Looks locked up."

He had to admit, she was right. In the dim light, the house looked uninvitingly secure.

"Alright, I'll check round the back, see if there's a window I can pry open."

"Don't bother." Mai strode confidently towards the door, eyeing the wood carefully.

Then she kicked the door hard enough to snap the deadbolt from the wall.

Sokka was impressed.

"I like it! Very direct."

Mai smirked, and gestured for him to follow her inside.

* * *

"Wow. It looks just like your place."

Mai scowled, and scraped the toe of her boot across the floor. It left a smear in the dust. "That was just rude."

Sokka shrugged. "I guess. I mean, you've got at least one piece of furniture."

The Sun residence was bare, wall to wall. Everything that distinguished a house from a series of empty rooms was gone. Dust floated lazily around them, thick in the shafts of dying sunlight through the windows. Covering his mouth with one hand to stave off a coughing fit, Sokka strode into the kitchen area. Opening a cupboard at random, he reached in and pulled out a small black object, smaller than his thumb.

It was a dead cockroach. He waved it at Mai, who stepped back, making a face.

"Why did you feel I needed to see that?"

"When even the roaches have moved out, this place has to have been bare for a long while," Sokka said, tossing the insect carcass aside. "Is it too obvious to say that I have a really bad feeling about this? Just, in general?"

Mai snorted. "I am getting the feeling that getting involved in this case is not going to win me all those friends and admirers people keep saying I should try to get."

Sokka nodded. "Okay. Let's look around."

Mai turned her head, taking in an appreciable majority of the ground floor. "Okay, for anything in particular? Because I think I see a lunatic with an axe hiding behind the ornamental fern."

"Check the walls. And the floors. And the ceilings," Sokka replied, already intently staring at the kitchen walls.

"So... literally everything still in the building? Well, it won't take long, anyway. What are you think- oh. Earthbending."

"Yup," Sokka replied, still engrossed in the windowsill.

"You think it's an earthbender?"

He shrugged. "It'd be really nice to get some conclusive evidence they _are_ an earthbender, right? It'd narrow things down a little."

Mai considered this.

"Okay. I'll check upstairs. Scream if you get murdered."

"Can do."

* * *

Mai had just finished establishing to her own satisfaction, once and for all, that there was absolutely no trace of earthbending on any of the walls upstairs, when she heard voices coming from outside.

"...here we have the last property on our list- the former owners moved out some time ago, and left the property to the city council to settle their debts, which, as you might imagine, means the price of this property is really _quite_ attractive. Of course, the interior furnishings were sold at a separate auction some time ago, but we were fortunate enough to acquire the property in question, and- and the door should not be open. Ladies, you may wish to stand behind me."

Mai hovered at the top of the stairs, content, for the moment, to see how this played out.

* * *

Sokka had his head in one of the cupboards when the door slammed open, so when he jerked up in surprise he smashed his head on the wood of the interior. Of course.

Rubbing the back of his head, he pulled himself out and to his feet, to be confronted by three worried faces- a clerkish-looking man in eyeglasses, standing in front of two confused-looking women- one of them dressed like a Kyoshi Islander, the other probably an Omashu local, and one with money, if her clothes and her reflexive sneering were any indication.

"Hi," he said, vaguely, as he fished in his pack for the letter Bumi had given him. "Just a second."

"Thief!" the man screeched, totally unnecessarily, Sokka was about three feet away at this point, "How did you get past the security?"

Sokka shrugged, and kept rummaging. "Kicked the door. I can pay for the deadbolt if that's what you're worrying about. I just- here!" he declared, presenting the letter, which the three obediently studied.

"I, King Bumi of Omashu, do hereby grant the bearer of this seal the authority to behave in any manner that pleases him, as long as he can explain himself to a reasonable degree," the Kyoshi Islander read, slowly. "That can't be real!"

"It is," the native said, wearily. "You get used to him, eventually."

"But- but what are you _doing_ here?" wailed the clerk.

Sokka should have thought that was pretty obvious. "I'm investigating the murders," he said, slowly, in case this guy was new, or had hit his head recently. It didn't do to make assumptions.

" _Murders_?" the native lady snapped, whirling to glare at the clerk.

"Yeah," Sokka replied. "You know, the murders? The three people who got murdered? The ones that lived here?"

"People were _murdered_ in this house?" trembled the Kyoshi Lady.

"Oh yeah," Mai's voice cut in, descending the stairs. " _Super_ murdered. Right here, probably. Nobody's caught the guy that did it, either. At least not yet."

"We're trying to find out how they got in," Sokka patiently explained, trying to inject a note of calm.

It didn't work. The Omashu Lady threw her arms up in the air in horror. "You're saying three people got killed in this house and _nobody knows how the killer got in_?" The clerk was now visibly sweating.

"Absolutely," Mai chimed in, which was not, in Sokka's view, helping. "Could be anywhere right now. They've killed other people, too. The city's brought us in because nobody seems able to stop this guy. They broke in here, killed everyone inside, and left without a trace."

" _I don't want to live in a murder house!"_ shrieked Kyoshi Lady. "Come _on_ , honey, let's get _out of here!_ "

As she stormed out, Omashu lady made to follow, but not before glaring at the clerk.

"After some thought," she hissed, "we have decided not to make an offer on the house. And as for you two," she gestured at Sokka and Mai, with a glare. "Sort this _out_."

Sokka waved. "That's the plan."

She left without a word. The clerk wilted.

"Why did you feel you had to do that?" he moaned, plaintively. "Why couldn't you have just been trying to rob the place?"

* * *

The sun had set, and the night mists had drawn in. Sokka and Mai had taken shelter in a tea house.

"So," she said, cradling the cup more for the warmth than anything. "No earthbending."

Sokka held up a slender finger. "No _signs_ of earthbending. But yeah."

She sighed. "Well, that was kind of a waste of time."

Sokka shrugged. "Eh. They can't all be winners. Don't go getting discouraged now, save some discouragement for later."

Mai snorted deliberately into her tea.

"So, any theories?" she asked.

Sokka stroked his chin, and peered out of the window, into the fog.

"I have no idea," he declared, eventually. "How about you? Any brilliant ideas?"

Mai shrugged. "It's not _my_ job to do the thinking. As far as I can see I'm in this for the kicking doors down and spooking realtors."

Sokka grinned.

"Why did we never hang out before?" he asked, suddenly.

Mai shrugged. "Your awful taste in friends?" she suggested, and Sokka nodded.

"Incredibly rude slight at a bunch of people I love more than anything and would actually die for aside, I'll take that."

Mai rolled her eyes, but not in an aggressive kind of way.

"Did you ever try wearing pink?" she asked.

"Uh, not really," Sokka replied. "It clashes with my eyes. ...Why?"

Mai shrugged, and brought her tea up to her lips. "No reason."


	5. When In Doubt

"Sokka, where are your clothes?"

Sokka was learning all _kinds_ of stuff today, and breakfast hadn't even happened yet. First up, apparently rich people had special clothes they wore when they didn't want to wear clothes, which just proved, in Sokka's view, that rich people were ridiculous.

"Mai I haven't had my bath yet. I don't know how it goes in the Fire Nation, but I've found that putting clean clothes on while you're still dirty doesn't actually make you clean. It's a shame but that's the way it is."

Mai glowered. "Bath robe, Sokka. It's what people wear on their way to the bath. Hence the name. It could also be worn when you're walking towards the dresser, or in bed, but 'bath' is the word that stuck."

Sokka considered this. The implications were disturbing, and he wasn't the type to just let the obvious question lie. Still, he found himself hesitating. He didn't actually know Mai that well- she'd saved his life once, but he'd got the feeling that she'd actually been trying to save Zuko, and he had been pretty incidental, so he'd never got around to thanking her in case she regretted it. But, she was the only person that could answer the question he knew would haunt him otherwise.

Well, he could probably ask Zuko, but this seemed like one of those things His Esteemed Fire Lordliness might get all huffy about.

"Mai," he asked, very nearly putting one hand on her shoulder before thinking better of it, "have you ever been naked in your entire life?"

Mai's stare could have withered a forest. "No," she replied, perfectly serene.

* * *

"I saw him! I saw him clear as day!"

Sokka leaned forward, notepad poised, while Mai froze in the middle of critiquing the old man's living room decor.

"Okay," Sokka said, soothingly, as the man nodded three or eight times, for emphasis, "tell me what you saw. Slowly. In as much detail as you can remember. Without deviating, or repeating yourself, or hesitating until someone gives you money. Just the facts. It could be important."

"I saw him!" the man repeated, with a scowl. "He stood eight feet tall, with glowing red eyes and fingers like claws!"

Sokka sighed, but dutifully noted this down. Mai turned back to investigating the bric-a-brac.

"Okay… so what happened? Did you actually see him attack anyone?"

"I saw him! I saw him, and he _looked_ at me, with his terrible red eyes, and he spat fire! White and blue fire, from the depths of the Inferno! And he tipped his hat, so he did, and then he leapt away, higher than the buildings! In one bound, he cleared the wall, and was gone!" The man was nearly frothing with excitement by the end, and Sokka took cover behind his notepad to avoid the bombardment of flying spittle. Mai took a strategic step further back.

"Right," Sokka said, awkwardly. "So… did you _actually_ see this absolutely real and accurately described guy committing any of the murders?"

The old man blinked. "Murders?"

Sokka groaned, and brought his hands over his eyes.

"Thank you, buddy, you have been no help at all. I am seriously tempted to ask for my money back."

The man protectively covered his hand, and the coins Sokka had been duped into giving him. "If you didn't like it, that's your own fault for asking me."

Mai snorted. "Can't argue there."

* * *

Mai sat in her chair, in her living room, and folded her arms.

She had some thinking to do.

Firstly, and most pressingly, she seemed to have acquired a housemate. This had not really been part of her plans. A lot had happened in the last two years that had not been part of her plans, and so she knew one when she saw it. Sokka was a complication.

A complication she had technically seen naked, and had then had to go sit in a corner and think about stuff for a while, sure, which made things _more_ complicated, and she had a sneaking suspicion things were only going to get worse from here.

This had all seemed like such a great idea when she'd set out.

Mai blinked, as two things occurred to her, jerking her out of her reverie. Firstly, that, now she thought about it, this had _not_ seemed like such a great idea when she'd set out: when she'd set out she'd just been angry and _confused_ and a little brokenhearted and it had seemed like the only thing _to_ do, which wasn't the same thing as thinking it was _good_ , which was kind of how she'd got into this mess to begin with; and, secondly-

"When did that plant get here?"

"Do you like it?" Sokka asked, emerging from the kitchen with two cups of tea. "I picked it up while you were trying to write down that one lady's entire life story. I figured it made the place look homey."

Mai accepted the tea, and stared at the small, flowering plant in its pot, on the floor by the window.

"I'm not watering it," she replied, eventually.

"I figured," he replied, sitting in the chair that had somehow become his, and setting out the notes from that day's walking and talking.

"And I wasn't trying to write her life story, I was waiting for her to get to the important part."

"Well, it sounded like you were going to have to wait about ten years."

Mai rolled her eyes, and sipped the tea.

"So," Sokka said, "what have we learned?"

"Nothing?"

"Yes. I mean no! We've learned a whole bunch of things our killer _isn't_. Probably not a waterbender, if they're a firebender they're the most careful one in the world, not a lot of evidence either way on earthbender."

"We've learned that nobody who wasn't already crazy or lying has seen them," Mai chimed in, trying vaguely to be helpful.

"That too," Sokka nodded, glaring at his scribbling like it might somehow help. "And they don't leave bodies. Except when they do."

Mai considered this. "Could an earthbender, I don't know, hide bodies under the street?"

Sokka's brow furrowed. "...I don't actually know. Maybe Yung can tell us."

 _Us_ , Mai noted. It had become _us_ pretty quickly.

Mai figured, while she was here, that this was a good opportunity to lay a long-standing debate she had been having with Ty Lee to rest.

"Speaking of earthbenders, you know that short earthbender you're friends with?"

Sokka blinked. "Toph? Yeah, what about her?"

Mai couldn't hold back a smirk. "Were you aware she had a crush on you?"

Sokka's face went blank. "How? And also why."

"Azula kept a file."

Sokka appeared to consider that, before shuddering.

"Yes. I was aware. Am? I know it is a thing that happened, and that is in fact one of the reasons I am here."

"Go on," Mai prodded.

"Because Toph is three years younger than me, she has only started going through puberty quite recently, and I would like all my bones to stay where they are, thank you very much."

Mai shrugged. "Fair point."

* * *

Sokka flopped back, and rolled his neck until he was staring at the ceiling. There seemed to be more knife holes in the crossbeam than last time he checked, which at least meant that Mai was hating this as much as he was.

"If you have any ideas," he announced, "now is absolutely the time to tell me."

Mai didn't answer immediately, but there was the sound of shifting upholstery, and, as he looked back down, she was sitting forward, frowning at the map, which was honestly more than he'd been expecting.

"There's… someone," Mai said, slowly. "She's not a witness or related to anyone, but she's… informed. She knows things. Professionally."

"Okay?" Sokka prompted. "You think she might have a tip about our guy?"

Mai shrugged. "It's worth a try. She's Fire Nation, lives down near the warehouses. She'd probably want to keep up to date with stuff like this."

Sokka shrugged. "Alright, what's her name?"

"Biyu," Mai replied.

* * *

Mai lurked in the corner, like she always did when Sokka was trying to wheedle something important out of a potential witness. Sokka was good at talking, Mai was good at persuading people to keep talking, usually just by standing perfectly still.

Biyu was a narrow, dusty-looking woman, hitting her forties if Mai was any judge, and she was. She had her hair in a bun tight enough to permanently raise her eyebrows, and she had her lips pursed like she was smelling something unpleasant and was about to complain about it.

"So, I guess introductions are in order. I'm Sokka, Water Tribe, and the scary lady in the corner is-"

"I know who you are," the woman snapped, hard enough that Mai blinked.

"Oh. Well… okay then! Makes things simpler, I guess?" Sokka tried, looking increasingly out of his depth. "We're here about the murders? We're trying to find out-"

"I know," Biyu interrupted again. "I know why you're here, and I don't know why I should say anything to _you_."

This was not how things were meant to go. Mai shuffled, but didn't interrupt. Not yet.

Sokka blinked. "...Why?" he asked, eventually, taking the direct route.

Biyu's eyes narrowed, and Mai found herself double-checking that she'd carried her dart launchers.

"My brother was an engineer on The Arrow's Flight," Biryu responded, and although that sentence was, to Mai, more or less a collection of empty syllables, Sokka froze.

"Oh."

"And now you come to me, sitting in my house with this traitor in tow, and you're asking for _my_ help?" Biyu's teeth flashed. "You're going to get what's coming to you, and I just wish I could be there to see it."

Something, Mai decided, was going wrong here. Sokka's hands were twitching and Biryu was glaring at him with a kind of angry vindication. It was up to someone to do something. It was up to someone really tactful and diplomatic to defuse the situation.

"Sokka," Mai interrupted. "Take a walk."

Sokka blinked, turning on his heel to face her, and for half a second Mai felt inexplicably guilty.

"I think she and I need to talk," Mai said, valiantly managing not to sneer, "patriot to patriot."

Sokka looked slowly from Biyu, still glaring a hole through his head, to Mai. She could see him trying to find the right way to phrase the obvious question, and she decided it would probably be best to help him out.

"I'm not going to start breaking fingers. I promise. Just… Fire Nation stuff, okay?"

Sokka's shoulders slumped, just a little, but he nodded.

"Fire Nation stuff. Sure. Well, I'll be outside, I guess?"

After the door had closed behind him, Mai pulled the chair he had been sitting on towards her, and lowered herself into it, sitting across from Biyu in just such a way that her arms and folded legs were aimed directly at her.

The woman grinned, in an unpleasant way, all teeth. Mai deliberately made sure her arms were unobstructed.

"Interesting company you keep," Biyu said.

Mai shrugged. It didn't seem like something that needed an answer, so she didn't give it one.

"You know what he's done, of course," she continued. "He's a killer."

Mai stared levelly. "Everyone's done something."

"Not everyone, and _certainly_ few can claim to do what he's done," Biyu replied, facade slipping for just a moment as her eyes flashed. "Ask him about airships, some time. Ask him what he did on the day of Sozin's Comet."

Mai leaned forward, holding in a snarl.

"I'm not here," she ground out, "to talk about Sokka. Or airships. Or Sozin's Comet." She breathed hard through her nose. "You _know_ who I am."

Biyu nodded, grin widening.

"And you know why I'm here. You know why I've spent a year in this city."

Another nod.

"Good. So, are you going to be helpful, or do I have to break a promise?" Mai asked.

After a moment, Biryu laughed.


	6. Like Strange Sins

Sokka was feeling fine and totally normal. Sure he'd gone on a walk, to clear his head a little. And technically, yes, he was not totally sure how long he _had_ been walking, and now he got right down to it he was out of breath in an unfamiliar part of a city he didn't know very well but the important thing was he definitely wasn't thinking about red skies and a grip on his hand slipping, so that had to be a win.

He slowed, and let his breathing even out. Overhead, shuttles roared on the skyways, transporting goods one way and refuse the other. One convenient thing about living in a city ringed by inhospitable canyons: you didn't have to go too far to throw your junk away.

Sokka froze mid-stride, foot landing heavily as the thought took over.

Could that be it? Could it be that simple? Could he maybe, just maybe, be on to something?

Okay. Don't get too excited. Don't go rushing off on a wild hunch. Just take it slowly, stay calm, and think it out.

Whistling inconspicuously, Sokka walked on, glancing nonchalantly upwards every so often, just to make sure he was still following the chutes.

* * *

Liu stretched, and set himself into a steady stance, as another shuttle plummeted towards him. With a practiced grunt, he pushed forwards, and the stone responded, catching the crate in place. Running a cursory eye over the marking on the label, he twisted, and shunted the crate onto the left-hand slope, where he gave it a quick shove, to send it on its way.

Then, and only then, did he grudgingly turn to answer the voice that had been yelling at the base of his tower for the past ten minutes.

Liu paused, suddenly noticing that the sounds of persistent shouting had been replaced by the echoes of scrabbling and grunts of exertion.

Liu's tower only had a ladder when Liu himself made it in the smooth stone, and regulations dictated that, for security reasons, tower walls should be unscaleable while the tower was manned. Nevertheless, after a few moments, a hand appeared over the lip, straining for purchase, and was quickly followed by another, and then by an entire head and shoulders.

A young Water Tribes man heaved himself bodily onto the floor of Liu's tower, and flopped onto his back, gasping for air. As Liu leant cautiously over, the figure stuck a hand out, waving a scroll in the air.

"Read this," the man panted, before collapsing back entirely..

Liu did so. It seemed to be the only thing to do.

* * *

While the guard read Bumi's certificate, Sokka took a moment to get his breath back. It was moments like these when he realised how often he took breathing for granted.

"Alright," the guard grunted eventually, handing back the scroll. "So what do you want?"

It took a moment for the memory to arrive, in between the way his ribs seemed to be trying to kill him.

"Oh yeah! I had… some questions… about the delivery system."

* * *

Liu blinked. "You're not an inspector, are you?"

"No. Just an investigator guy. Investigating. That's what I'm doing."

Liu considered this, as a rumbling rush in the distance surged down the chute towards him. He turned his back on the Water Tribes guy, catching the delivery just in time. Scanning the label, he pushed it on as quickly as he could, and then let the breath he had been holding out.

The man appeared at his elbow, scratching his chin.

"And that's all there is to it? You just check the writing and push it along?"

Liu was beginning to wonder if he was the butt of a joke. "Yes."

"You don't, I don't know, check it? To make sure it's what it says it is?"

Liu sighed. Some people had no understanding of civil infrastructure. "Look. The shuttles are descending the ramp at a rate of fifty miles an hour down a slope that is at its steepest point forty degrees-" Liu paused, aware that he was about to engage in technical minutiae with someone that thought being taught to throw a spear at a penguin was how you defined 'an education' and decided to show a little mercy- "by which I mean-"

"If we take the base of this slope as the centre of a kind of invisible wagon wheel with three hundred and sixty spokes, the slope comes in at about spoke forty, assuming we're counting the spoke at your feet as 'one', I get it," the man prompted, making motions with his hands, and Liu felt the need to awkwardly clear his throat.

"Yes. That. They're moving fast. If I catch them, read the address, and then decide to rummage around inside, you know what happens? Another shows up. Speaking of which-" he turned back, and slowed the shuttle that had arrived until it ground to a halt, glanced at the address, and sent it on its way. "And if another one shows up while I'm lifting up the canvas to check that this shuttle really _does_ contain cabbages, you know what happens? I don't get my bonus for efficiency, that's what. And also I die because three tonnes of rock and radishes is now lodged where my head should be."

"Okay, okay," the man replied, suitably contrite. "You've made your point."

"Good."

* * *

Sokka was almost sure he didn't hear the muffled 'Jerk' as he turned away, but his eye was caught by something a lot more interesting.

Pinned to one of the two inside walls of the tower was a plan, coloured lines and names lined neatly in squares and curved edges. It was, he discovered as he leaned in to peer at it, a map. A route map of all the cargo lanes in the city.

Perfect.

Making sure he wasn't being watched, he gently prised the map from the wall. This guy probably didn't need it anyway, Sokka was almost sure.

"Uh… not to be a pain but could you see your way to helping me get back down? Thanks."

* * *

Sokka flopped down in his chair, and removed his prize from inside his jacket laid it on the living room table, next to the map of the city, where thirteen crosses dotted the landscape.

Mai wasn't home yet. That vaguely worried him, but he told himself she was probably a lot more dangerous than most people in the city. He just hoped she wasn't out looking for _him_. That could get awkward.

Putting that out of his mind with a hand on the bridge of his nose, Sokka pulled the map towards him.

So. He had a theory. Now he had to do the boring bit, and try not to get too upset if it turned out he was totally wrong.

* * *

Two hours later, and he'd drunk six cups of tea, got up and walked around the room four times, left the house on the pretext of getting food once, and probably stained his left hand green forever, but at least he'd kept the ink from getting on the carpet.

And he had an address.

* * *

Waste disposal in Omashu was an involved, and possibly revolutionary, process. Instead of the standard hygienic practice, as demonstrated in the metropolis of Ba Sing Se, of throwing whatever you didn't want into the street and trusting that someone else _would_ , refuse in Omashu was collected, by a civic authority, put in the same stone shuttles that transported almost everything throughout the city, and shunted to small warehouses on the lip of the canyon, where they were emptied, and their contents tipped over the side. Often, this part of the process didn't even need people- instead relying on certain inevitabilities of gravity, and some well-placed stones to help them along.

The squat, shabby building was, basically, a tube. The wall that faced the city had a cargo chute that led directly into the darkness of the building. The wall that faced the yawning expanse of the canyon was open, a hole punched through the outer wall of Omashu.

And there was a door. Sokka had been trying to work up the nerve to try the handle for about ten minutes.

"You know," murmured a familiar voice, right in his ear. "Don't take this the wrong way but i really wish you weren't here right now."

He hadn't heard her creeping up on him, but he probably shouldn't have expected to.

"Oh?" he asked, turning to face Mai as she slipped out of the alleyway. "How come?"

"If you weren't here, I could have convinced myself I got a bad lead and just gone home," she confessed, with a shrug. "But here you are. Which I guess means we have to check it out."

Sokka grinned, a little nervously. "We could always not, and just say we did," he replied, a little more sincerely than he would have liked. Something about this place was making his skin crawl.

Nevertheless, he reached up, and tried the handle.

Locked. Of course.

Mai wordlessly nudged him aside, and squared off against the door. For a moment, Sokka was convinced she was going to kick it again, but instead she pulled a couple of small slim pieces of metal from inside a sleeve, and knelt down in front of the lock.

"Where did you learn to pick a lock?" Sokka asked, conversationally.

"Prison," Mai replied, absently, as the lock gave with a click, and the door swung inwards at her push.

"Wait," she said, as Sokka stepped forward. "You armed?"

Sokka's hand jerked a flap of his coat aside, revealing the machete on his left hip. Mai regarded it coolly.

"Stay behind me," she said, and Sokka shrugged, following her into the darkness.

* * *

The warehouse was one single room, inside. The evening light weakly pushed through the yawning gap in the right-hand wall, highlighting a smooth and shallow ramp that crossed the entire length of the building, until it reached the other wall, where, at about head-height, the lip of the chute jutted through. In one corner, a neat pile of stone shuttles was stacked up.

And that was it. But still Sokka was on edge. He couldn't place it, but something was kicking in his memory, trying to make a connection.

"Huh," said Mai. "I was expecting corpses or something."

Sokka shook his head, pacing the edge of the room, one hand on the handle of his machete. "They'd smell, if they were here," he replied. "Although… why am I getting reminded of Hama?"

Mai cocked her head. "Hama?"

"You never heard that one? Remind me to tell you some time, it's great," Sokka replied, blithely.

Hama's prison was the kind of thing you didn't forget in a hurry, although Sokka had tried pretty hard. The worst part had to be, of all things, the _smell_ \- a mix of blood and sweat and feces-

Sokka paused, and sniffed the air suspiciously. _That_ had been what had been reminding him! Which was good, because it meant he wasn't just randomly going down unpleasant memory lane again.

* * *

Mai raised an eyebrow as Sokka sniffed the air.

"Smell that?" he asked.

"Smells like ...dung and rotten vegetables," Mai replied. Which was what she'd expected. This was where trash wound up. If it smelled like lilies she'd have been concerned.

"No, there's…" he trailed off, mesmerised by a stain on the ramp that Mai had been gamely trying to avoid. "Something else…" he squatted down, and peered at it.

Mai averted her eyes, looking up at the ceiling in an attempt to distance herself from whatever Sokka was sticking his face in.

* * *

"Blood," Sokka declared, grimly. "Guess this is the place after all."

Mai didn't respond, which, in Sokka's view, was a waste of a good dramatic revelation.

"Did you hear me?" he asked, standing up. "I said-"

Mai was stock-still, staring upwards, jaw set. Slowly, Sokka followed her gaze.

It took him a moment to realise, in the gloom, what he was looking at.

From his position on the ramp, in the centre of the room, he could see a long, wide smear of blackened wood in the inside of the ceiling. Something- some _one_ had scorched the inside of the building with a burst of fire.

Before either of them could speak, Sokka heard a sound he'd heard already that day- a rumbling thunderous roar that got louder and louder as it accelerated and he just had the presence of mind to dive to one side before a stone crate burst from the mouth of the chute, hitting the start of the ramp at just such an angle as to land on its narrow side and fling its contents onto the ramp.

What emerged, and began to slowly slide down into the abyss, wasn't a person. Not any more.

Sokka just recovered in time to grab it by the ankle, stopping it before it slipped off the side and was lost.

"I think," Mai said, evenly, "that this is the time when we go get your friend the Captain."


	7. As It Fell

While Sokka dashed through the city, heading for the Palace, Mai sat in the gathering dusk and thought hard, the corpse slumped on one side of the ramp, the lengthening shadows slowly turning it from what remained of a person into a mere collection of vaguely unsettling shapes.

The corpse wasn't what was bothering her. She'd checked it just enough to make sure it wasn't someone she knew, and, when it had turned out it wasn't, there her interest had ended. Something else was on her mind.

She hadn't been lying when she'd told Sokka she wasn't happy to see him. She'd been hoping (a bad habit she'd thought she'd shaken) that his murderer would keep him out of the way, and wouldn't get mixed up in this. Obviously, though, that had been too much to ask for.

She looked up at the ceiling again, and scowled. It was now, in fact, too dark to see anything more than a textured blackness where the sky should be, but just because she couldn't see the scorch mark didn't mean she could forget about it.

The best case scenario, which was so much a childish fantasy that Mai was pretty sure she should dismiss it out of hand, was that one of Sokka's Murderer's victims was a firebender and hadn't been all the way dead by the time they got here. This was a nice theory as long as you didn't have a very specific piece of corroborating information.

Mai, unfortunately for her peace of mind, did have this extra fact, and it was this: according to Biryu, by way of a trail of six other people Mai had had to bribe, intimidate, or take entirely on faith, someone looking uncannily like Princess Azula had been seen entering this building less than a month ago.

* * *

Yung raised his helmet a narrow fraction, and ran his free hand through his hair. Squatting down, he joined Sokka in staring at the body. Around them, three other guards peered busily around the building, and Mai skulked in a corner.

"So," he rumbled, as Sokka scratched his chin thoughtfully, "what do we know?"

Sokka furrowed his brow, and looked down, to where the body lay. "He's a young guy, maybe about twenty? Clothes look pretty well-made, but plain. Fire Nation colours, though, which is kind of surprising- not seen a lot of red around the city lately. Killed like the others, looks like- knife to the back, one blow, stabbed straight through. Professional work."

"And all that adds up to?"

Sokka pushed himself to his feet, and winced as his back clicked. "I have no idea."

Yung couldn't hide a sigh.

"You know, soldiering was a lot simpler than this. You saw a firebender, you threw a rock at them."

Sokka patted him on the shoulder. "Yeah, well, we all had to grow up at some point, buddy. I'm gonna look around, you shout if he gets any better."

* * *

As Sokka moved towards the stone boxes that dominated the far corner, Mai took the opportunity to sidle over to Captain Yung, still contemplating the body.

After a moment, when it became obvious that he hadn't noticed her, she cleared her throat.

"Oh," he said, looking up, eyes narrowing into that 'I find the fact that you're breathing the worst kind of insult but right this second I still care that I'm not allowed to do anything to rectify this' look Mai had come to know and love. "It's you."

Mai didn't have the energy to waste on conversation. "Were any of the victims so far firebenders?"

Yung looked a little taken aback. "Firebenders? No."

Mai tried to keep her voice level. "You sure?"

Yung looked offended. "I know the names of every firebender I have been forced to allow into this city. I know where they are. None of them are missing."

Damn. "Okay." Mai drifted away, paying no further attention to the Captain.

Well, that settled that then.

On the plus side, Sokka was only _probably_ going to die.

* * *

Sokka sloped over towards one of Yung's goons, gloom crystallising on him like frost.

For at least an hour there, he'd thought he'd cracked it. It made sense, didn't it? Once you found the bad guy's lair, there'd be an obvious clue which laid out exactly who they were, usually along with why and how they'd done it, and after that all there was left was an exciting chase or fight that almost always wrapped everything up neatly, and the bad guys died or went to jail and everyone else learned an important life lesson about racism or the importance of sharing or why you should never ever trust anybody, for any reason.

At least, that was how it had gone with Hama, anyway. All he had here was a whole tangle of eels.

He ambled over to where one of Yung's guards- a tall woman with a severe haircut- was scratching her chin, and staring at the neat stack of stone crates.

"What've we got?" he asked, casually, and she almost jumped.

"Agh! I mean, we've got crates." She gestured to the pile with one hand.

Sokka nodded. "I see that."

The guard paused, with one finger dramatically held up to eye level. "...So who stacked them up like that?"

Sokka froze. Okay. This was it. This was The Big Clue that'd wrap this whole thing up by tomorrow night. "...Who would normally do it?" he asked, carefully, like a man edging out onto a tightrope.

She shrugged. "Not sure? I think someone comes in to these kinds of places once a week, to make sure the crates aren't piling up too high. The broken ones get turned back into earth, and the working ones stack up for… collection? I suppose? I never worked civic, it's really not my area."

Sokka breathed slowly. "So… you think if someone totally unconnected came in here to clean up, they wouldn't notice?"

They both turned to face the room. He had to admit, now he looked, it looked kind of like… a shed. He could easily imagine some overworked guy coming in, stacking boxes, and walking out again without ever looking at the details.

"Damnit," he murmured, under his breath. "Is it too much to ask that more people spend most of their waking hours checking if mysterious stains are or are not blood? It would really make this whole process go a lot smoother."

Turning on his heel, Sokka strode back towards Yung in a fitful burst, trying hard to ignore how all his big ideas seemed to be turning into a bunch of little questions instead.

"So," he said, forcing a happy smile, "any idea who this guy was yet?" He gestured towards the body at their feet.

Yung shrugged. Sokka tried to be surprised, as he stared at the body again, trying to will a pile of unconnected facts into something approaching a complete picture.

Young guy. Fire Nation- wearing Fire Nation clothes, anyway. The man had died with his eyes closed, and Sokka was still kind of working up the nerve to touch the body. Pale complexion, dark hair, didn't necessarily rule out Earth Kingdom blood. Anyway. Fire Nation clothes, looked pretty well-tailored, but not flashy. Which meant… which meant… which meant there was an actual expert in Fire Nation culture and fashions leaning up against the wall frowning into space, and Sokka hadn't thought of asking her opinion yet.

Forcing himself not to look like he was giving up and making it someone else's problem, Sokka cleared his throat.

"Mai? Any ideas?"

Mai blinked herself out of whatever fantasy world she had been inhabiting, and drifted serenely over towards where Sokka and Yung were huddled.

"Hmm?" she intoned, hands tucked neatly into her sleeves, a gesture Sokka was surprised to find strangely reassuring. It was always nice to see someone _else_ who walked around with one hand drifting close to some kind of blade all day, he supposed.

"Wanna have a turn figuring out who this is? We've got nothing."

* * *

Mai turned her attention down at the body, half-expecting it to sprout scorch marks, or to suddenly notice the telltale signs of murder via lightning (hair burning off, various important parts melting, heart exploding, and other various things conjured up by a brain that, now that Mai thought of it, had never actually seen anyone get killed by lightningbending). Instead, the corpse just lay there, stiff and horrible and just a little dull.

What were they expecting her to do? This wasn't her job.

Except, of course, neither of them knew that. They thought she was here to catch a murderer. Maybe she even was.

So, holding in a sigh, she stared at the body, looking for some detail, some clue that might…

Oh. Well, that was kind of obvious, now she looked at it.

* * *

"He's a servant. Or, was, I guess."

Yung blinked. "A servant? Where?"

Mai shrugged, a move seemingly calculated to make Yung's jaw ache. "You wanted an answer, you got it. He's dressed smartly, but not so much that he'd show anyone up. Looks like a uniform, but an expensive one. Probably a footman or something somewhere."

Sokka rubbed his chin. "Okay, now we're getting somewhere. But… where in Omashu would people be dressing their servants up in red?"

The three stared at the body, Sokka's brow furrowing intently. Slowly, his hands steepled together, and raised in front of his mouth. His breathing slowed.

Finally, he spoke.

"There's always… the Fire Nation Embassy."

There was a pause, as all three of them considered the implications of this.

"...That'd be it, huh," Mai drawled. "Not like any other Fire Nation citizens are hiring help in this town." She, at least, didn't look perturbed by this new theory.

"So what we have here," Sokka said, slowly, apparently to the corpse, "is an actual, for real Fire Nation guy who's here on official Fire Nation business. It's not just Fire Nation-born people who moved here any more. This is someone who moved here on the orders of the Fire Lord, with a guarantee of safety from King Bumi. And now he's dead, and I'm pretty sure we can rule out accident."

Another moment of thoughtful silence drifted through the air, before Mai broke it.

"So, who wants to be the one to start a war?"

Yung closed his eyes. "I will talk to the Ambassador. In the morning."

He tactfully failed to notice the way Sokka's shoulders sagged in relief.

"Thanks. And when you do, assuming you don't get called on to active military service again right away, could you drop by and let us know who this poor guy was? I'm thinking that learning everything we can about him as quickly as possible might be a really good career move."

* * *

She should tell him. She _really_ should tell him. This wasn't just something that might help with the case, not knowing this could get him killed. At some point, it had become vaguely important to Mai that Sokka not get himself killed. He knew how to cook, for one thing.

And he was someone to talk to and he kept trying to make her laugh on purpose and he didn't seem even a little afraid of her. Most people were, in her experience. She'd made a point of it. Making people a little uneasy was a skill she'd spent a lot of time working on, and she'd relied on it like never before since coming to Omashu. But Sokka didn't seem to notice, or, more likely, care. He talked to her like she was a person and even a person that _wouldn't_ skewer him full of knives the second he did something to vaguely annoy her. Which was probably even correct, but she'd worked hard on developing the interpersonal technique of implying imminent spiky violence with an eyebrow, and she was finding it a little weird that Sokka was so aggressively normal at her.

She needed to tell him. How hard could it be? 'Hey Sokka just so you know I've been kind of lying to you this whole time, hope you're okay with that.'

She could phrase it better, probably.

"So," he sighed, as they strode out into the frigid air, "that was fun. Where do you want to go eat?"

She couldn't help edging a little closer to him, warding off the cold. Her lips curled in thought.

"I know a place," she said, eventually.

Tomorrow, she decided, as the first flakes of snow began to drift down around them, turning orange in the firelight from a dozen windows. She'd tell him tomorrow.


	8. A Hole in a Stained-Glass Window

Sokka jerked upright, blade swinging through darkness, connecting with nothing. The only sound was the hammering of his heart in his ears, and the dull roar of his heaving breath.

After taking a moment to make sure that yes, the bedroom had in fact not transformed into an inferno of steel and rushing wind, Sokka wiped the sweat from his forehead and blinked droplets out of his eyes, feeling vaguely stupid.

Well. He was up now, wasn't he?

The sun hadn't risen yet, but Sokka had spent most of his life growing up in a place where sunshine was that thing you only got for half the year, and so padded across to the window, untroubled by the gloom. Throwing it wide, he stuck his head out into the frigid air, and breathed deep through his nose.

The snow had kept falling throughout the night, and now it lay thick and undisturbed across the street, a muffling blanket that turned the world formless and indistinct.

A sudden idea fizzed through Sokka's brain, and he couldn't hold in a grin. Letting the window slam shut, he turned and dashed back into his room, looking for his boots.

* * *

Mai wasn't sure why she'd woken up. Blinking, she grumbled and peered at the walls, painted grey by the thin trickle of dawn light from the window.

Everything seemed pretty normal, so maybe she could just fall back to-

Something hit the window with a dull thump, and Mai's eyes snapped open.

So. They'd come for her. Finally, it was happening.

Slipping a robe around her shoulders, she stalked over to the window, buckling a dart launcher to her right arm as she went. She'd pick up the rest as she made her way downstairs, assuming she had the time. Sokka- she'd wake Sokka up on the way, probably. Maybe they'd leave him alone, if they were just after her.

Bracing her back against the adjacent wall, she leant carefully over, reaching one hand out to the latch of the window. With a sudden snap, she undid the latch and let the window swing wide, and flattened herself against the wall, listening intently for the sounds of a braying mob full of patriotic exuberance in general and a desire to string her up on a pitchfork in specific.

Nothing.

Which either meant her paranoia was finally becoming more of a problem than a survival tactic, or she was being besieged by something a lot sneakier than a peasant uprising.

With almost imperceptible slowness, Mai edged towards the window, and took a calcuated risk. Inching one eye out beyond the threshold, she was pretty sure, was a safe enough bet- between her curtain of dark hair and the gloom of the room, she had to be presenting a target about the size of a-

She barely spotted the snowball looming out of the darkness before it collided with her eye, and sent her tumbling onto the floor.

Lying flat on the cold wood, right eye stinging and cold, Mai considered her options.

Azula was unlikely to be throwing snowballs. Which left only one real option: she'd been got. She'd been got _hard_.

Gathering her dignity around her, she rose up from the floor, and returned to the window, glaring out at, yes, Sokka, standing in the street, knee-deep in snow, another snowball in hand, smirking up at her. She was going to _do_ something about that.

"I will destroy you," she promised, before slamming the window shut and pulling on her outdoor clothes.

* * *

Sokka poured the tea into two cups, and brought them into the living room, where Mai was sitting smugly.

"Don't take this as me admitting you won," he warned, setting tea down in front of her, before slumping back in his chair contentedly.

"Hmm," she replied, noncommittally. "Which one of us got hit so hard they did a backflip?"

"Okay, first, that was _dodging_ , have you never seen dodging? Also, I'm pretty sure I remember _someone_ getting hit by the Mega Snowalanche, and the back of my shirt is pretty dry."

Mai contrived to look scandalised. "Okay, ignoring that an avalanche is made out of snow _anyway-"_

The lively debate was interrupted by a sudden knock at the door. Without waiting for a response, the handle was turned, and Captain Yung strode in, looking decidedly unwell.

"Captain!" Sokka said, with a grin, completely failing to notice the mood Yung was surrounded by. "How'd it go?"

Yung made his way over to where Sokka and Mai were sat, and ran a hand over his hair.

"In a way, we've been lucky," he said, looking like a man that hadn't slept in far too long. "The boy's name was Liwei. He was a footman at the Embassy, as we'd thought. The Ambassador, however, is… not going to press the matter, just yet."

Sokka blinked. "...Okay? They're just going to let it go?"

"I didn't say that," Yung replied, snappily. "She is, however, content to let the current investigators pursue matters. She will not be reporting this to the Fire Lord, just yet."

Mai steepled her fingers, sitting back and crossing her legs in a manner that, in her opinion, made her look like she was deep in cognition.

"Something's up here. Not wanting to start a war I guess I can understand, but actively keeping something like this from Zuko? Madam Ambassador's risking her career over a lackey."

Yung shrugged. "I don't know about that. I wasn't trained for this job."

"No," Mai agreed, absently, but before Yung could be offended, Sokka stood up.

"Okay! So I'll head out to the Embassy, see if I can get any answers out of anyone. Should be back in a few hours."

* * *

The Embassy, Sokka found, wasn't much more than a big townhouse. Three floors, judging by the windows, and a small courtyard at the back. There was a wide flight of steps leading up to the entrance, which might technically make storming it by force more difficult, especially in the snow, but really Sokka had been expecting something more fortified.

There _were_ a couple of guards standing at the top of the steps, leaning on spears. They weren't wearing the full-face masks, just open helmets, bundled up in heavy cloaks, so their vision would be better but they wouldn't be able to move around easily and besides they were probably hating the cold and he wasn't going to have to fight them _anyway_ but it never hurt to be prepared, right?

Taking a long breath, he set his shoulders and advanced on the stairs.

* * *

Lei leant on his spear, huddling into himself in an attempt to ward off the cold. Guarding the Embassy was a pointless gesture, but it was a gesture Lei understood _. Here_ , it said, was the line in the sand. Cross me, and you are in Fire Nation territory. And you know what happens when people are disrespectful in Fire Nation territory.

Of course, the entire city had been Fire Nation territory, not so long ago, Lei reminisced.

He was jolted out of this happy rememberance by the sudden approach of a figure in a tan coat stamping its way up the steps. Lei snapped to attention, and, at his side, Shen did the same.

The figure drew up with them, and coalesced into the shape of a young Water Tribes man, who waved awkwardly.

"Hi, uh, I was wondering- I mean… Let me start over. I'm Sokka, Water Tribe, and I was wondering if I could come in?"

The shock ran though Lei's spine. He knew that name. Companion to the Avatar. Personal friend of the Fire Lord. Vanquisher of the Grand Fleet.

He'd assumed he would be taller.

Lei's knuckles tightened on his spear, as he observed the man in deliberate silence. If half the stories about Sokka were true, Lei had no chance, if he indulged his very insistent fantasy of driving his spear through the man's head. But Lei had his pride, and he'd be damned if he let this man past the threshold.

"Do you have an appointment?" he rumbled, looking down at Sokka from the end of his nose.

"An appointment? I guess not, but listen, it's about-"

"If you want to make an appointment, you need to send an application in writing. Unless you're a Fire Nation citizen seeking asylum, in which case you can be allowed in, pending two testimonials as to your circumstances," Lei recited, woodenly.

Sokka blinked. "Alright, maybe you didn't hear me, but it's important. I'm here to-"

"If you are unable to find two witnesses prepared to testify," Lei continued, with the tenacity of a landslide, "and are unable to produce a written application, we can also accept a passport." Lei held out his hand expectantly. At his side, Shen began to snicker.

After Sokka had left, defeated, Shen leant over.

"...What's a passport?"

Lei shrugged. "I think it's an Earth Kingdom thing. I was part of the occupation of Ba Sing Se, I got hassled for passports a lot in the first couple of days, before the locals had worked out what was going on."

* * *

Sokka slumped on the sofa and exhaled loudly. Mai raised an eyebrow.

"It's almost like you're not popular in Fire Nation territory, huh."

His lack of response was telling. Mai tried to be comforting.

"So," she said, prodding him in the shin. "What's the plan?"

He turned to face the ceiling. "I guess, wait until that guy isn't on guard duty, and try again? Surely at least one guard has to be reasonable, right?" He sounded like he was trying to convince himself, and doing pretty badly.

Mai, who had firsthand experience of how unreasonable the Fire Nation's finest were, as a rule, shook her head slowly.

"I think," she said, "I have a better idea." Pulling the slip of paper out of her sleeve, she dropped it on his chest.

"I get these letters all the time," she said, by way of explanation. "I never reply, so I'd forgotten about it until just now."

Sokka straightened the letter out, and sat up.

"We are honoured to invite the Lady Mai," he read, clearing his throat, "to a function at… The Fire Nation Embassy." He blinked. "...What?"

"I get invited to pretty much everything the Ambassador throws," Mai drawled. "It's their way of saying 'we haven't forgotten you exist, please don't cause trouble'."

Sokka cocked his head. "You get invited? Even though you've never shown up?"

Mai shrugged. "I'm old money. I very nearly married the Fire Lord. Besides, they generally try and round up anyone with any kind of title just to fill out the tables."

"Even with the whole tried-to-kill-Azula thing?"

Another perfect opportunity to bring it up sailed right by. Mai watched it go.

"That all got pardoned, remember? I actually got a bunch of new titles, and a medal. I'm officially Protector Of The Fire Lord's Person, Lord of one of those islands that has a permanent residence of three goats and half a pirate, and I think I'm a colonel? Zuko kind of went overboard. Ty Lee got a warship named after her."

Sokka appeared to consider this. "...Huh."

"So yeah. I'm not popular, but the high society code of conduct means they think they have to invite me to stuff. They just really hope I never turn up."

"So," Sokka said, stroking his chin, "we accept this invitation, turn up, upsetting literally _everybody_ , and once we're inside we just ask annoying questions until we get some answers or get thrown out?"

Mai shrugged. "Not like we've got any better ideas."

Sokka read the invitation again, more slowly. "...A celebration of opening of diplomatic channels between the Fire Lord and Kyoshi Island… Attended by… Commander Suki of the Kyoshi Warriors."

Mai thought she could decipher that face. She'd made it often enough, at least on the inside.

"If you wanted to stay behind," she offered, slightly awkwardly, "I'd get it."

Sokka gave her a slow and brittle smile.

"...Thanks. But no way are you walking in there without backup."

There was a way to gracefully and smoothly acknowledge that without either embarrassing herself or him, Mai was almost certain of it.

"You ever notice that there only seem to be about twenty people in the world?" she mused, instead. "You can't go anywhere without a couple of the old gang showing up."

"Yes!" Sokka exclaimed, with a sudden burst of gratification. "I have noticed that! It's like, when I show up here, practically the first person I run into- almost literally- is you! What are the odds of that?"

"Exactly. Or how Bumi is _still_ King."

Sokka paused, and scratched his head. "...No, I don't think that's one. That's just how monarchy works. He'll be King until he dies."

"That's my point," Mai insisted. "He's _so old_. Why is he still alive?"

Sokka shrugged. "Good diet?"


	9. Neat, Clean, Shaved and Sober

"They have blue?" Sokka asked, incredulously, staring at the racks of clothes. "I thought they hadn't heard of blue in this city! And why does this place have so many _shirts_? And why are they all… lined up like that?"

Mai fought the urge to roll her eyes.

"Don't say that kind of thing so loud, they'll figure out you've bought clothes at reasonable prices and ask you to leave before your sense of proportion rubs off on anyone."

Back hom- in the Fire Nation, Mai would have been measured up for a dress at least a month in advance, something would have been designed to Mother's exact specifications, Mai would have been left standing still for what felt like hours while tailors poked and prodded and measured her and she'd have been working up the energy to get silently, resignedly furious about the whole thing. Money wouldn't have been discussed in front of her delicate ears, just in case the vulgarity of finding out that tailors couldn't just live off of the sheer joy of being in proximity to nobility did her an injury or something.

Here, she walked into a shop on the morning of the party with a purse full of coins, and she fully expected to leave with a new outfit in under three hours. Not everything about Omashu was worse.

Sokka's hand hadn't moved, still absently running the heavy velvet sleeve of a dark blue shirt between thumb and forefinger, his eyes distant, a frown wrinkling his nose.

Mai narrowed her eyes, and poked him in the side.

"What?" she asked, sharply, as he started.

"It's just… I was thinking… I don't _need_ to go in all Water Tribe Pride, right? I'm starting to wonder if that's diplomatic." He didn't seem like he was even trying to be convincing.

"It's an embassy," Mai replied, more to prod him than to actually try and change his mind. "They let foreigners in sometimes. That's kind of the point of embassies." She could not actually have cared less what colours he wanted to wear, but the fact that now, after _hours_ of complaining that Omashu didn't let him display his patriotism as loudly as he wanted, was making excuses, was indicative. Of something. Probably.

Sokka squirmed. "I'm pretty sure they'll know who I am. It's just I'd feel more comfortable if any potential assassins couldn't pick me out of a crowd so easy."

As excuses went, she had to give him points for that one.

"So, what were you thinking? Red would blend you in pretty nicely but that'd probably actually be _more_ offensive."

He shrugged. "I wore black when I was training with Master Piandao. I felt that look worked for me?"

Mai was all set to deliver a response when her brain kicked a door down and demanded someone repeat the first half of his sentence.

"You trained with who now?"

"Master Piandao? He's a guy, master swordsman, you might have heard of him?"

Mai felt, somehow, that she was beginning to see what had had Biyu so spooked about this guy.

"You trained," she said, slowly, "with Master Piandao. Shu Jing Piandao. The greatest swordfighter in recorded history. Piandao the Hundredslayer. Not, you know, some other Piandao the totally unrelated swordsmaster who isn't the most feared and respected non-bender on the planet."

Sokka looked like he was trying to work out if he should run. "Yes? ...I mean, not for very long, we were on a schedule. But he gave me some pointers and liked my art and then we made Space Sword out of a meteorite and then I told him the truth about where I was from and then we had a duel and then he told me a few other things and gave me the White Lotus tile (although I had no idea what that meant at the time, it's not like I had time to pay attention to secret societies) and said I'd be a better swordsman than him if I kept at it but I kind of lost Space Sword so that's not happening I guess."

Mai took a moment to process this. It was so absurd she couldn't even muster up the capacity to be jealous.

"Everything I learn about you is the new most improbable thing I've learned about you," she announced, after a while. "Go look at shirts, I need a minute after that one."

Once Sokka had vanished gratefully into the racks of clothing, Mai leant against a clothes dummy, and scowled at the wardrobe on display. For the first time in years, Mai was thinking hard about what to wear. Mother, she felt, would be so relieved.

Black was the obvious choice- Mai hadn't spent a decade building a personal brand just to throw it away on a whim- but she at least knew that 'complementing colours' didn't actually mean 'everything you wear must be the same colour'.

Red was the traditional complement, of course, and since this was a Fire Nation event on Fire Nation soil where the whole purpose was to give the Fire Nation standard a non-threatening airing, not wearing red would probably be frowned upon.

But she wasn't feeling it, honestly.

And then she had an idea. An idea guaranteed to offend, shock, and disgust pretty much everyone in attendance. If she played her cards right she could get actually accused of treason again, or at the very least sedition.

Perfect.

Now all she had to do was find an assistant that wouldn't make any smart comments.

* * *

They were back at her home, resting in the living room, daylight still streaming through the windows. She still hadn't told him. The thought was gnawing at her, deep in the pit of her stomach. She was putting it off, and she didn't know _why_.

Did she _like_ him not knowing? Was that it? Did she somehow find it _nice_ that he didn't suspect her of any kind of ulterior motive, that he just seemed to accept her without asking for any kind of further explanation? Was she afraid of that changing, or something? Was she just putting off the fact that, once she told him, he'd be a lot more careful? That he might, would have every right to, suspect her?

Well. When she put it like that.

This was _it_ , Mai decided, with a sudden burst of irritation. She was going to _tell him_ , here, now, while nothing was on fire and there was no way anything could interrupt, she was going to bring it up and they were going to talk it out and he'd be sensible about it and not ask too many annoying questions and at the end he'd know enough to watch his back in case someone tried to stab him with a lightning bolt.

She cleared her throat nonchalantly, and Sokka looked up.

"Did anyone ever tell you why I left Zuko?" No, shit, that wasn't what she'd meant to say _at all_ -

Sokka scratched his chin. "Because he kisses like an elderly relative is watching?"

Derailed, Mai blinked. "...What?"

Sokka's hand seesawed. "You know, all 'even though we're two consenting adults I'm still very concerned that my grandmother might burst in and have to confront the fact that I'm not five any more, maybe it'd be safer if we just hugged'. That."

Mai's eyes narrowed. "...How do you know what Zuko kisses like."

Sokka scratched his chin, determinedly avoiding her eyes. "...You know, that one might actually be a state secret."

Mai shook her head, banishing, with some reluctance, the insistent mental image. "Whatever. No. It wasn't because of that. And he does get better with practice, you probably just spooked him."

Sokka nodded, thoughtfully, as though she'd answered a riddle he'd been thinking about for a while. She slid back in her chair, turning sideways with her shoulders propped against one arm of the chair, her feet dangling over the other. She stared blankly at the ceiling, and absently drew a knife, twirling it around her fingers in a comforting way.

If she was going to tell this story, she might as well be comfortable.

"We were fighting a lot," she said, quick as ripping off a plaster. "Leading up to the wedding. Apparently that's pretty normal if you're not in an arranged marriage" _one of the downsides_ , her mother had said, but with a smile, and had it been weirdly nice to have Mother's approval for once? "but it wasn't about the usual stuff. Okay, it wasn't _all_ about the usual stuff. We fought about everything. Stress, I guess. But we also brought up a lot of stuff that maybe we should've talked about a lot earlier."

Sokka made a very carefully neutral sound, and Mai realised she had paused.

"We talked about the Fire Nation, about his dad, and… about Azula."

She risked a glance, but Sokka didn't seem to have reacted.

"I told him he was wasting time and effort trying to find her. I told him it wasn't a good look for him to be spending so much trying to track her down, made him look insecure. I told him to drop it."

Sokka's eyes narrowed in thought. "You took her side," he said, slowly.

Mai forced herself to shrug. "I guess that's how he took it, yeah. I don't think he forgave me for that. And that was it, I guess. After that… it was like everything I used to find really endearing and charming about him just seemed really _annoying_? I guess we'd started to resent each other. So I broke up with him. He wanted it, but he'd have never done it himself. Zuko can't get enough of self-flagellation."

"Well," Sokka said, carefully breaking the growing silence, "I think you made the right call."

"How nice of you," Mai replied, as deliberately scathing as she could muster.

"Yeah, I mean I wouldn't want to marry Zuko either."

Mai snorted. "He's a wonderful guy," she said, singsong, "and he's going to make someone really happy if he ever gets a social life again. But that someone isn't going to be me."

* * *

Sokka stared at the mirror, scowling at his reflection.

The hair on the sides of his head was getting long again, and not in a way that suggested he meant it to be like that. Kind of late in the day to be worrying about that, though.

He couldn't help it, though, analysing everything about his appearance- the way the black velvet jacket fastened just slightly too loose at his neck, the way he'd managed to scuff one of his shoes without even leaving the house, the fact that absolutely nothing in the world was going to disguise the bags under his eyes. And, if he was honest with himself, he knew exactly why he was thinking like that.

"Hey Suki how you doing? Me? I'm obviously fine, please don't pay any attention to my terrible boots. Sleeping? Sure, I'm sleeping, can't you tell? Nightmares? What nightmares? I don't know what you're talking about Suki, I'm doing _so_ great since we broke up."

"You're talking to yourself". Mai's voice cut through the door, startling him. "That mean you're ready? Because I rented a coach, and and he's probably freezing to death out there. If you care about that kind of thing."

Sokka found, to his mild surprise, that he was smiling.

Mai had been pretty good company recently, even though he was getting the increasing feeling that she was waiting for him to say something but he had no idea what. It was nice to have someone on his side. Plus, she talked more than he remembered her doing back in the day, so that probably helped.

"Sure, just a second," he replied, raising his voice, rather than opening the door.

As her footsteps trailed away down the stairs, Sokka glanced back at the mirror.

Eh. He could pull off the Grizzled Overworked Yet Still Strangely Handsome Investigator look. It'd have to do.

* * *

Mai was standing by the door, arms folded, when he made his way downstairs, and it took him a moment for his brain to decipher what his eyes were seeing.

Mai was dressed, for the most part, like she usually did- black featured heavily, as did long, open sleeves. But the undershirt she was wearing, only a sliver visible under the dark velvet of her coat, was _white_ , and over her shoulders she had draped a deep blue shawl.

It was probably a coincidence. It was probably an accident that she'd decided to go to a Fire Nation party dressed in Water Tribe colours.

He was staring.

"Uh," he espoused, and Mai's eyebrow raised.

"Something wrong?" she asked, and Sokka thought he might just have heard the unspoken start to that sentence, which was _did I do_ _._

"No!" he said, hurriedly. "It's fine, it's just… they're gonna _hate_ you."

She shrugged. "Figured this was the best way to confuse any assassins."

Sokka's mouth twitched

"Come on," she said, while he tried to figure out what his heart was supposed to be doing. "Let's go before the driver loses a toe."

* * *

This was it, Mai reflected, as the carriage slowed to a halt, the firelight of the embassy streaming through the window. No going back after this. Even as distracted as he was these days, Zuko was going to hear about this. She'd hidden from him pretty effectively, she thought, but even he couldn't fail to hear about her gatecrashing his ambassador's party.

Which put a hard time limit on things. If Zuko hadn't suddenly learned restraint or tact in the last couple of years, then he'd be sniffing around Omashu. He'd want to know how she _was_. He'd probably, and the thought sent a shudder down her spine, want to _patch things up_.

The second Zuko showed an interest in Omashu, Azula would be _gone_. And Mai's plans would finally, definitively, be ruined.

So she'd better get this right, and hope like crazy that something useful turned up at the Embassy.


	10. A Tarantula on a Slice of Angel Food

Commander Suki of the Kyoshi Warriors huffed in frustration, letting her fingers drum an irritated tattoo on the hilt of her (ceremonially tied into its sheath, for the peace of mind of the diplomats, as if the thing that made it dangerous wasn't the fact that it was _her_ holding it) sword. As little as an hour ago, she would have remembered to care about everything Zuko's aides had warned her about, and not made such a warlike gesture, but by now? Now she was just shy of actively hoping that someone would take offence at her. Or rather, that one of the dozens of people in the room that were obviously taking offence at her would grow the backbone to try and do something about it.

But, for now, there was nothing to do but try not to scowl, and do her best to ignore the ushers announcing all those guests that had decided to arrive fashionably late.

At least the buffet was acceptable. Someone had even gone to the effort of importing real stewed Kyoshi plums, and watching unsuspecting guests try and eat them had been the real highlight of the evening so far. The sight of puffed-up third-rate dignitaries suddenly choking and trying to find a polite way of coughing up everything they had ever eaten was probably going to get old eventually, but so far she was experiencing a vicious stab of national pride every time it happened.

She'd almost certainly been away too long, she reflected, if she was getting patriotic about fruits.

* * *

The embassy glowed. Flaming torches flanked the steps, the snow swept back, lurking at the edges, flakes hissing into nothing as they fell too close to the fires. Sokka could have sworn he recognised a couple of the guards as he and Mai swept past them. He valiantly resisted the urge to stick his tongue out at them.

Mai stared blankly ahead as they passed the doorway, into the warm dull glow of the interior. As they were gently ushered towards a large door, outside which a servant waited, placidly, she leant almost imperceptibly towards him.

"You armed?" she murmured, the rasping edge of her voice setting his chest rumbling in sympathetic shocks.

"Knife tied to my inside thigh," he replied. "Why?"

Mai ignored his question, and regarded him coolly. "Kind of inaccessible in an emergency."

He shrugged. "Not really. You'd be surprised how quick I can get my pants off."

Mai appeared to give this due consideration.

"Hmm," she replied, her voice coming from somewhere far away. "I'll bear that in mind."

"Huh?"

"Never mind."

* * *

She probably shouldn't have said that. If there was a good time for spontaneous faux-insincere comments about casual sex, 'just as he's about to have to go confront his ex' was almost certainly not one of them. But he didn't seem to have picked up on it, so she supposed she'd gotten away with it.

At the time, she'd just assumed Zuko was abnormally bad at picking up on cues, but now she was starting to wonder if it was something to do with her.

The announcer waiting at the door had taken notice, and bustled towards them. As he bore down on them, she saw Sokka draw himself up and set his jaw, torchlight flashing in his eyes and this was _not the time_.

Also, she should probably do something, like gently remind Sokka that this wasn't actually a fortress that needed storming, no matter how the line of his jaw turned to diamond when he was considering how best to raze this place to the ground.

She stepped forward, in a way that, she hoped, eloquently conveyed 'my companion here's a little skittish, maybe you don't want to rush at him like that.' Fortunately, the man stopped short, and his eyes widened, dropping into a bow.

"My Lady Mai!" He declared, doing an al,oust passable imitation of someone who was delighted to see her. "You do us too much honour with your presence." Straightening up, the man glanced askance at Sokka, and his confidence visibly wobbled for a second. "And- ah… how shall I introduce your companion?"

Sokka looked to Mai for clarification.

"He's got to announce you," she explained. "You know, yelling at the whole party about who you are and why anyone should care?"

Sokka visibly winced. "Oh. Wait, I get a say on what I'm called?"

Mai shrugged. "Sure. Why?"

* * *

"May I announce the Governor of Goathouse Isle, Protector of the Fire Lord's Person, Colonel, First Class, the Lady Mai."

Suki's back froze, but the announcer wasn't finished.

"And, accompanying her, Sokka, Man of the Southern Water Tribes, a detective."

...She had to have misheard that. She and, judging by the sudden outbreak of whispering, everyone else in the room. They all had to have misheard that.

...a _detective_? What kind of game was he playing at now?

* * *

The ballroom was large, but tall mirrors lining one wall contrived to make it seem bigger even than it was. Red drapes and carpets dominated the walls and floor, and, at regular intervals, large, wide-bottomed braziers held glowing coals, giving off heavy incense-scented smoke. A table heaved with food at the far end, and, moving through the crowd of whatever Fire Nation nobility could be scraped up in this forsaken part of the world, dark-coated waiters moved with trays heavy with glasses.

Mai smiled, condescendingly. Bless their hearts, they'd really tried.

She tilted her head, and Sokka took the hint, proceeding alongside her into the centre of the room, the crowd parting in front of them like a cheap waterbending trick. It wasn't that people were _avoiding_ them, it just so happened that everyone suddenly recognised an old friend over in a conveniently distant corner of the room that they just had to go talk to.

The whispers swirled around them- the guests probably thought they were being very discreet, but unluckily for them Mai had very good hearing.

" _-Shouldn't have brought that man here, it's an insult-"_

" _-against everything we're trying to accomplish tonight-"_

" _-did you see what she's wearing? Does that mean-"_

" _-Almost surprised he hasn't got her_ collared _, I mean-"_

Okay whatever that last one meant (and it didn't sound like it meant what Mai would have taken it to mean, from the context) Sokka's jaw had seized up, so that might merit a response.

On the other hand, punching some ignorant new money snob in the teeth would be a really good way to get kicked out, and this whole plan would have been for nothing. So she held her temper, like always, and hoped that Sokka had the good sense to hold on to his.

* * *

She wasn't glaring, she told herself. She was _observing_. She would have to be an idiot to enter a conflict like this one without doing some reconnaissance.

They had to have seen her. It wasn't like she was hidden, done up in full dress uniform like this. They had to know she was there.

She was aware, in a dim way, that she was acting a little bit irrationally. But, to be frank, so what? Wasn't she allowed that? Wasn't she entitled to feel just a little furious that _this_ was how he decided to let her know he was alive? A year and a half of nothing, just a message left with Uncle Iroh that he needed a break to clear his head, and then he just _showed up_?

But she wasn't glaring. Definitely.

* * *

"Who're they staring more at, you think?" Sokka murmured out of the corner of his mouth, as the two of them slunk across the floor.

It was honestly pretty much impossible to tell, given that Sokka seemed to be trying to actually hide behind her. Mai shrugged. Sokka nodded tightly, like this was a perfectly satisfactory answer.

"Seen the Ambassador yet? 'Cause it's just occurred to me that I have no idea what she looks like."

Mai's gaze swept the room, very deliberately not lingering at all on the painted and armoured figure of Commander Suki, who was glowering at them over by a brazier. Her eyes locked on the sight of a short, youngish woman with elaborate hair, before she slipped unobtrusively out of the room, through a side door.

"Got her. She's just left. I'll go after her, you camp out here. If you get the chance, corner a servant. Odds are they'll at least know who Liwei was."

"...Sure. Good luck."

There was something in his voice that almost made her change her mind, but before she could decide what to do about it he was gone.

* * *

Mai had vanished, stalking out after Ambassador Yan, which was possibly really bad news, but mostly for the fact that now Sokka was by himself.

Suki's eyes narrowed as he snagged a drink from a passing waiter, and turned his back on the room, facing at the wall.

If there was ever a time to go over and say hi, this was almost certainly it. But her feet didn't want to cooperate.

* * *

The drink burned the back of his throat and his nostrils flared wildly, eyes stinging. Gently, he set his cup down, and stared at it, the way it sat, condensation dripping on the long red tablecloth, ice bobbing gently in the clear liquid. He tried to remember what Aang had talked about when he went on about breathing. In through the the mouth, out through the… no, that wasn't it, was it?

Around him, figures swarmed, dull red and indistinct, and the chatter swelled to a roar echoing in his ears.

* * *

If the ambassador was surprised to see Mai lurking in the hallway, she didn't show it.

"Lady Mai," she said, moving into a textbook bow. "I cannot begin to tell you how delighted I am that you have decided to grace us with your presence."

"Hm," Mai replied.

"I hope everything is to your satisfaction," the ambassador replied. "If you want for anything at all while you are staying in this city, do let me know. It is, after all, my duty to assist my fellow citizens."

Mai let a single eyebrow drift upwards. "Since you mention it…" She moved towards an empty office, and gestured for the ambassador to follow.

* * *

The smoke worried its way up his nose, thick and choking, and he screwed up his eyes, trying to block out the red, and his heart was racing and his ribs were creaking inwards and he _knew_ he was starting to panic and that made it worse and he forced his eyes open and over the blood and wind howling in his ears he could hear heavy footfalls behind him and there was no way out no way to escape so when the enemy was almost on him he made a decision.

He turned, and swung as hard as he could.

* * *

The room froze, dozens of people stunned into silence, but Suki was already moving, slipping through the forest of frozen bodies, heading towards the centre of attention.

Sokka had just, for no immediately obvious reason, turned around and punched a guest in the face.

She almost wished she could be surprised.

Somewhere, in the back of her head, she was very, _very_ angry right now. But that could wait.

So much for clearing his head, apparently.

* * *

He let out a breath, and uncurled his fist- when had he made a fist?- and… and he'd just punched a guy in the face.

He looked down, slowly, as the world swam back into focus, presenting him with the horribly solid image of a stunned young man sprawled on the floor, clutching at his jaw, tears glinting in his eyes, and a couple of basic points reasserted themselves.

He wasn't on the airship, he was in Omashu. He was at a party. He'd been _allowed_ into this party. Nobody here was allowed to kill him, nobody here was _trying_ to kill him. And he'd just punched a guy in the face for tapping him on the shoulder.

As humiliation and horror crawled up his throat, he was dimly aware of someone shouting his name. Strong hands gripped his, and, unresisting, unregistering, Sokka allowed himself to be led away.


End file.
